Natural Magic
Natural Magic
Magic flows into Elakore from a central point: this is called the ‘Life Pole’ or to the Magi, simply ‘home’ from the pole magic prisms out into the various energies that make up the magic used by mundane or ‘symbolic’ casters. The symbolic casters grope blindly at magic and pull it into use with spells and symbols. Magi see magic as it is and move it directly to achieve effect.
Flows
There are eight flows after the prisming, each has a color and an area of influence in magic:
Life white
Dimension black
Time purple
Sound blue
Light red
Matter brown
Mind green
Enchantment gold
These can be thought of along a wheel with opposing and dominating forces among them
So that Life dominates time, which dominates matter which dominates light which dominates dimension which dominates mind which dominates enchantment which dominates sound which dominates life. When using two or more flows the effect will always lean towards the more dominate one. So if a spell is determined to be of dimension, mind and enchantment then dimension will be the primary effect with mind being second and enchantment being third.
Opposing magics are life/dimension, time/mind, sound/light, matter/enchantment. Magics in opposition cannot be used together. So for example enchantment and matter could not be used to take a rock and turn it into a gold ring and add a spell to it. any rock that had been turned into a gold ring would be incapable of holding an enchantment you would need to get a real gold ring for that. this also means that no more than four flows can be used in a single spell. As past that point you are in opposition and dominance. So you could have an enchantment spell that works with sound, light and time but that would be the limit. (since mind dominates enchantment matter opposes, etc. )
Each of the four symbolic magical paths in the world is focused on one of these areas: Rune is mind, war is light, ritual is sound, and fetish is enchantment. The spells touch others but are always formed and controlled with the magic that its path is tied to.
For magi, and those born ‘of sight’, everything in and on Elakore has magic that flows through and around it. Magic gathers around things that have an affinity for it’s type, the earth pulls matter magic down, the sky lifts light up, life surrounds animals and plants, mind races into their brains and nervous systems, sound moves from source to source and gathers where loud noises persist (waterfalls and the like) enchantment binds all magics to each other, time draws life out of beings and pushes all magic towards its pole and dimension surrounds those things that are not of this realm, gathering around curtain rifts and the like.
Across the surface of Elakore are eight poles, the life pole from which all magic originates, the dimension pole where magic ends it’s journey and passes into another realm: The Mind pole deep in the lands of the elves; the Enchantment in the lands of the dragons; the Sound pole in Couorn of the Seven Kingdoms; The Light Pole in the Great Human Empire; The Life pole as is already stated is in the land of the Magi; Dimension rests on the lost continent; The matter pole lays undisturbed in the sacred mountains of the Avery; while the Time pole is lost deep in the beast realms west of the seven kingdoms.
Magi see these flows and control them, and on a rare occasion one of the other races of Elakore is born with the sight. The sight either develops into power or reduces the afflicted person to a catatonic state. Some call those who can use this magic Maglings but they have no strict relation to Magi on any level.
Natural Magic Skills
Natural Magic as a skill works exactly like any other skill, but to a certain extent you have control over the Situational Modifier you will receive on your skill check. Just like symbolic magic the mana required to cast a spell is spent regardless of success. Unlike Symbolic Magic though, there are no spells to direct the power into form, this is the great challenge and power of the Natural Magician.
How you choose your skills as a natural magician is key The Base Skill Natural Magic opens the gate and sets the base level of success for all of the Realm skills. The First Realm Skill you choose indicates your character’s Affinity and sets their point on the realm wheel in much the same fashion as a Path does for a Symbolic caster. This Affinity however does not preclude learning a second Realm or provide the more strict limitations placed on symbolic mages. It does preclude the character from learning opposing realms as additional realm skills though. So a character that has an Affinity for Light would not be able to take sound as an additional realm.
Success Chances
Casting begins with the Affinity of the character, this is the base success chance to the character. Each additional realm added to the desired effect adds a situational Modifier of –10% UNLESS the additional Realm skill is taken and at the same level (or higher) than the Affinity of the character.
For Example: If I have a character with the following skills in natural Magic
Natural Magic 50%
Realm Light : 20% (total 70%)
Additional Realm: Dimension 20% (Total 70%)
Additional Realm: Mind 10% (Total 60%)
Then light specific magical effects would suffer no SM based on skills, nor would the addition of Dimension, however adding Mind to the mix would incur the –10%.
If the effect desired does not involve the Affinity of the character as the primary realm (adding a spooky glow just to involve light for instance would not make that the primary realm in use!) or at all then the effect receives a SM of –5% for each step away from the Affinity for realms the affinity dominates Opposing Realms are not possible to cast, and dominating realms gain a –10% per step past the opposition of the Affinity as such
additional Realms
Affinity Light Dimension Mind Enchant Sound Life Time Matter
Light 0 -5 -10 -15 -100 -10 -20 -30
Dimension -30 0 -5 -10 -15 -100 -10 -20
Mind -20 -30 0 -5 -10 -15 -100 -10
Enchant -10 -20 -30 0 -5 -10 -15 -100
Sound -100 -10 -20 -30 0 -5 -10 -15
Life -15 -100 -10 -20 -30 0 -5 -10
Time -10 -15 -100 -10 -20 -30 0 -5
Matter -5 -10 -15 -100 -10 -20 -30 0
Beyond the Realm skills the scope of the desired effect will have a SM tied to it based on the following table.
Reality Modifier Table
Type Situational Modifier
Casual Magic – Unnoticed 0
Slightly Magical – Slight of handish -5
Clearly Magical – Demonstrated unnatural effect -10
Frighteningly Magical – Powerful magical effect -30
Beyond Magical –
Effects that are unheard of -40
Godly Magical -60
And just like regular skill use a roll of 00 (100%) invokes a Blunder, however blunders tend to me much more serious as follows on the Terrible Terrible Things Table below
Terrible Terrible Things Table of Joy
01-10 Random Dimensional Shift
11-25 Random Mutation
26-30 move to random pole
31-45 Slip backwards in time 1d8 seconds
46-55 Slip forward in time 1d8 seconds
56-82 Shift to random dimension
83-89 Lose 50 Mana (or mana and hp equiv)
90-94 Attract dimensional notice
95-99 Attract temporal notice
99-00 Lose 100 Mana (or mana and hp equiv)
Mana Costs
The base cost for any effect is based on two factors 1) the Affinity of the character and 2) the Reality Modifier of the effect desired. All effects start at a Mana cost as follows:
Reality Modifier Table
Type Mana Cost
Casual Magic – Unnoticed 10
Slightly Magical – Slight of handish 15
Clearly Magical – Demonstrated unnatural effect 20
Frighteningly Magical – Powerful magical effect 40
Beyond Magical – Effects that are unheard of 70
Godly Magical 100
For spells where the Dominating Realm is the Affinity of the character this is cut in Half (all fractions are rounded up) However adding additional realms to the spell will reduce the overall effect of the Affinity by 10 percent. So a spell with two Realms with the Affinity dominating will have a 40% reduction in mana costs, three realms 30% reduction, Four 20% beyond four realms the Affinity can no longer be the dominating realm in the spell.
This results in base mana costs as follows:
Realms Casual Slightly Clearly Frigteningly Beyond Godlike
1 5 8 10 20 35 50
2 6 9 12 24 42 60
3 7 11 14 28 49 70
4 8 12 16 32 56 80
+ 10 15 20 40 70 100
Range/Duration/Casting Time/Effectiveness
Range is based on the desired effect as well as the skill in the flow in question. The Base range and area of effect for any given effect is as follows.
Spell Range Based on Total Level in Effects Dominating Realm
Level (including Base Skill) Max Range
26 Touch
30 6’
35 10’
40 12’
45 15’
50 20’
60 30’
70 55’
80 120’
90+ 250’
Once the Maximum range is known the area of effect is simply determined by the range not used. For instance: if a character has a range that is a maximum of 10 feet and uses 5’ (casting distance 5’ from caster) then the area the effect can cover is limited to 5 cubic feet.
Maximum Duration is based on the Base Skill Natural Magic
Spell Duration Table
Level in Natural Magic Max duration in Actions
25 2
30 3
35 5
40 7
45 8
50 9
Casting Time is dependant on the Reality Modifier of the Effect in question.
Reality Modifier Table
Type Casting Time
Casual Magic – Unnoticed 1 Action
Slightly Magical – Slight of handish 2 Actions
Clearly Magical – Demonstrated unnatural effect 4 Actions
Frighteningly Magical – Powerful magical effect 8 Actions
Beyond Magical – Effects that are unheard of 16 Actions
Godly Magical 32 Actions
Range, Duration and Casting time can all be modified based on the Effectiveness of the skill used in the same manner a symbolic magician would. Simply divide the Effectiveness to reduce or increase the desired aspect of the effect by one unit (feet, or actions depending.)
Effectiveness is also spent to overcome any type of resistance, be that the lifeforce of a target, the sanity or willpower of an opponent etc. But every point used to reduce casting time/duration etc. is one point less available to overcome any resistance.
Sustaining an Effect
At the end of the effect’s duration the character can attempt to extend the spell. This is done by making an unmodified skill roll on the dominate realm used in the effect. Upon a successful skill check one half the original mana spent on the effect is spent, and the resulting effectiveness of the skill is applied to the effect as duration.
Realms and Their Usage
Light
Light congregates in areas of bright illumination and moves up towards the sky naturally. It can be used to either supply light by gathering into small areas or to create fire and heat energy. Typical magical ideas for Light based magic include the Fireball.
Sound
Sound congregates in areas where loud noises persist such as around waterfalls. It moves from source to source perpetually. It can be used to produce sounds and mimic a given noise as in ventriloquism or used to produce dense and invisible ‘shields’ by creating areas of resonance.
Matter
Matter magic clings close to the ground and permeates all inorganic matter. It can be used to change matter from one form to another such as from liquid to gas or solid. Changing from one type of matter to another is also possible but considered unstable and dangerous.
Mind
Enchantment
Life
Time and Dimension
The concept of Time and Dimension are very important in the proper use of Natural magic. Imagine that the dimension in which the characters exist on elakore is a ring:
This ring is one dimension and the one that the characters exist in. time runs around this ring at a constant rate for this dimension. Next imagine that there is a piece of paper attached on the ring that indicates present or ‘now’ and the whole ring rotates at a constant rate moving ‘now’ through time one instant at a time.
Along the ring there are other sheets of paper spaced at regular intervals.
These can be considered ‘future’ or ‘past’ in a very general way but there are distinctions that must be made. In the strict sense of the word the future is not the one the PC’s will live when the ring rotates them into the ‘time’ that another sheet occupies, likewise the past will not be the same that the PC’s just experienced. Those experiences are trapped inside the sheet in which they exist and does not persist either way. Those sheets are complete worlds in and of themselves that house independent realities (no not dimensions we’ll get to that in a second) all these sheets represent the total possible variations of this one dimension and in a very real sense exist simultaneously in time. Matter cannot transfer between them, time based magic links each sheet to the ring and to it’s neighbors.
So if this ring is a dimension there are other dimensions literally thousands of them. Each can be thought of as a ring of it’s own, it has it’s own sheets and rotates them through time just like Elakore’s ring does. These rings all sit as if along a large ring with a common center point they move along the ring in one direction or the other. Sometimes passing through one another. When this happens any sheets on those rings that happen to align have a curtain rift. This can last a moment or a long time depending on the speed of the rings involved. It can be a portion of a sheet or an entire sheet depending on the size of the dimensional rings and the speed of time along them. If the sheets are moving along their rings at the same speed, the rings are the same size and are perfectly aligned for a long period of time a major rift occurs and can have world changing effects. However dimensional magic can move things from one dimension to another. For this to work though two sheets on differing rings must be aligned perfectly around the greater ring. At any given time the number of dimensions that meet this criteria can vary but there are a fixed number of matched dimensions (248 including the one in which the characters exist). Many of these dimensions contain a very similar existence to the one the PC’s live in, with slight variations perhaps based on a choice in the PC’s life or some basic difference in the structure of the world contained in the sheet. Symbolic magicians have only blindly been able to tap one of these alternate dimensions and from it they draw out necromantic magic. Magi have no such limitations, but searching through all dimensions to find something only gives you a limited chance of finding exactly what you wanted and ‘close enough’ often has to do. Searching takes time depending on how far you search (how specific the request is) and likewise becomes more difficult and requires a greater expenditure of magic.